Google hopes to remake programming with Go
Summary
Google hopes to boost both computing power and programmers' abilities with an open-source experimental programming language project called Go.
Topics
Google software luminaries such as Unix co-creator Ken Thompson believe that they can help boost both computing power and programmers' abilities with an open-source experimental programming language project called Go.
The computing industry is in constant tension between making a fresh start and evolving the current technology. The limits of today's hardware designs and programming technology led the Go team to take the former approach.
"We found some of those problems to be frustrating and decided that the only way to address them was linguistically," said Rob Pike, a principal software engineer working on Go. "We're systems software people ourselves. We wanted a language to make our lives better."
So far, Google's Go project consists of the programming language, compilers to convert what programmers write into software that computers can run, and a runtime package that endows Go programs with a number of built-in features. It's most similar to C and C++, but, Pike said, it employs modern features and has enough versatility that it could even be used within Web browsers.
For more, read "Google hopes to remake programming with Go" on CNET News.
Talkback Most Recent of 13 Talkback(s)
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Could be a really cool programming for old C/C programmers!!
I will definitely try it out.
DonnieBoy11th Nov 2009 -
No. No pointers.
Umm, no. No pointers, no "*" symbols littered in my code
anymore, thanks.
. . . and, frankly, it pushes typing from bad to worse. No
OOP, and no replacement, other than what looks like a fairly
weak interface system? At the very least they can look at
typing systems that work rather than whining about how they
think typing systems don't work.
A whole lot of research has gone into typing in the field of
computer science - so yes, there are alternatives to the C++
and Java styles of typing. To just throw it all away sounds
totally naive.
OOP was a lot more about typing, frankly.
It was a way of organizing large projects. Despite their
claims to the contrary, OOP can actually make large projects
easier. The only reason why OOP is a barrier to creating
large projects is because many people go overboard and get
obsessed with making zillions of small classes.
If you keep the inheritance fairly clean and avoid making
everything you encounter a class, you should be fine. I have
no issues writing large projects.
In addition to providing a typing system, one of the things
inheritance provided was scope: The ability to control
the visibility of variables. And no, I really don't think
that silly capitalization rules and suffixes are a good
replacement for a decent packaging system.
Nothing is more painful in a large project than name clashes.
The scope frankly needs more clarity and the developer really
needs more control over scope than Go provides.
This is not a serious language. It's a toy.
CobraA111th Nov 2009 -
They Should .....
have had a LOOK at the S-lang project first. A C type language, with garbage collection , seems to have a lot of the functionality, access to the C library core ....
see http://www.s-lang.org for more info.
linux4u11th Nov 2009 -
Why?
I question the point of doing this. There are already loads of programming languages out there, why add yet another one to the mix? What is the benefit? Seriously I am a fan of Google but it seems like they keep trying to reinvent the wheel instead of helping make the existing wheels better.
For instance, they could contribute to Ubuntu or some Linux distro and pump money to improve the UI and apps (basically make it like OSX but free, since OSX is essentially the only mainstream Linux-like operating system out there); instead, they say "We're making our own operating system!".
They could contribute to Python or Ruby or one of the dozens of other great languages out there and make it better, instead they say "We're making our own programming language!"
They could have done like Amazon EC2 and offered a customizable cloud stack that could be used for any language, but instead they made it pretty much proprietary.
It seems Google has delusions of grandeur and thinks that they can do X better than anybody else, instead of taking Y and making it more like their vision of X.
wayne6268211th Nov 2009 -
Agree, but think on this...
"It seems Google has delusions of grandeur and thinks that they can do X better than anybody else, instead of taking Y and making it more like their vision of X."
Lets replace X with some of the things that Google has done and see what happens to that statement.
1. Search. Yep, did it better then anyone else.
2. eMail. Arguable, but IMO and of many others, best internet web-mail service. And IMO, the only reason its not as widely used as Google search is that the switching costs (headaches) of moving from an e-mail address you've used for 10 years to a new one is just too much for many people. At this point, I wouldn't switch off gMail even if something better comes along - too much headaches.
3. Cloud computing - jury still out on that one, but there was no product Y to take and change to be more like product X - everyone starting from scratch here.
4. Browser - hailed as the best, but still infantile. Last barrier is plug-ins and Chrome will finally be better then Firefox.
5. Mobile OS. Windows Mo 6.5 is no comparison (a joke). the iPhone in general is a joke (mainly thanks to AT&T, but also Apple). Only serious contender here are the Blackberry phones. So can't call it best, but it is very very nice. Remains to see how it matures. Its too bad Verizon is going to kill the Driod with all the hidden fees associated with it.
6. Chrome OS. Can't comment on this one as its still in vapor-ware mode. We'll see.
7. GPS navigation - for years I've hoped and prayed that Google would partner with some GPS manufacturer (I'd prefer Pioneer, but any would do) and give us a GPS navigator product based off Google maps so we can forever get rid of the clunky, horrible mapping tech that the GPS makers use. Its not surprising - their specialty is the hardware, but the content was always deemed 'good enough'. Well its not. Google maps are amazing and now that they are getting ported to mobile devices, a GPS device is sure to follow.
So by my count thats 5 or 6 out of 7 values of X for which Google DID do better then anybody else. That's a pretty good track record in my book. Perhaps you aren't giving this language the full benefit of a doubt?
"The views expressed here are mine and do not reflect the official opinion of my employer or the organization through which the Internet was accessed."
gnesterenko11th Nov 2009 -
thoughts
"At this point, I wouldn't switch off gMail
even if something better comes along - too much
headaches."
I would in a heartbeat. IMAP works great for
moving to somebody else, and I'm a bit sick of
the totally flat tag system and poor filters.
"4. Browser - hailed as the best, but still
infantile. Last barrier is plug-ins and Chrome
will finally be better then Firefox."
Gonna depend on how good the plugin system is.
If developers flock to it, and there's a
central place for users to get them, then yeah.
Otherwise, maybe not.
"the iPhone in general is a joke"
In your opinion, of course. I don't have exact
numbers, but it is very popular.
"Google maps are amazing and now that they are
getting ported to mobile devices, a GPS device
is sure to follow."
Google maps are an amazing technology - for
mapping. Not sure they're amazing for turn-by-
turn real time navigation.
CobraA111th Nov 2009 -
Why?
Why? I'm not a programmer at all buy I do understand that
when a completely new outcome or paradigm is planned
then it requires completely new inputs. You know "if you
keep doing what you always do, you will keep getting what
you always get".
What I think is happening is that Google has a plan that will
make the OS, the desktop, and the browser
indistinguishable as separate entities, maybe a completely
new/different OS entity. And if an application or program
runs in this environment it will run in any environment all the
way across the internet.
bigpicture11th Nov 2009 -
Why not help something that already exists?
As others have said I think they should have helped improve something that already exists rather than requiring folks to have to start from scratch again.
Done it too often already, thanks, so you other guys go on without me.
johnd12611th Nov 2009 -
RE: Google hopes to remake programming with Go
I thought that was the argument for JAVA. Are Google just doing this to have their own language?
agsGeoff11th Nov 2009 -
VoiceOfLogic12th Nov 2009 -
RE: Yet Another Crappy Language
glad to see an expert on the subject! so many
compelling arguments, so many valid points! my
god, what WAS google thinking? and that long,
detailed report about it's various
incompatibilities and areas in which it couldn't
be scaled. so good!
moron
ranatalus12th Nov 2009 -
Wow, lots of hating...
I'm glad to see we have so many programming language experts on ZDNet. Since we all know Ken Thomson and Rob Pike don't know anything about programming languages. Oh, wait, right, most software in existence is written in languages and using practices they developed along with many others on their team.
I, for one, am thrilled by the prospects of this new language. However, I actually understand why they need it. Google has two choices capable of working _at_all_ with their MapReduce based architecture: Java or Python. They both suck to varying degrees for that purpose. The big win is with multi-processor, multi-node software that needs to deal with concurrency and scalability problems. That's not a matter of "fixing" an existing language. It really is a matter of starting from scratch, IMHO. All the rest is gravy.
cabdriverjim12th Nov 2009 -
RE: Google hopes to remake programming with Go
compiled code for browsers? sounds interesting. it's about time something replaced javascript.
iieugenio17th Nov 2009
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